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    Step in the Dark
    Step in the Dark
    Step in the Dark
    Ebook251 pages5 hours

    Step in the Dark

    By Ethel Lina White

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    About this ebook

    The story „Step in the Dark”, written by Ethel Lina White about the novelist, Georgia Yeo, who has a successful career. However, she is timid and hesitantly makes decisions that may further have consequences. The novelist meets a charming nobleman. But is he really what he seems?
    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherKtoczyta.pl
    Release dateOct 29, 2018
    ISBN9788381629102
    Step in the Dark
    Author

    Ethel Lina White

    Ethel Lina White was born in Abergavenny in Monmouthshire, Wales in 1876. She initially worked for the Ministry of Pensions but quit her job in order to write. She is the author of over 15 mysteries and thrillers, several of which were made into films. The Wheel Spins, a masterpiece of suspense writing about a beautiful young girl on a train and her missing companion, was immortalized by Alfred Hitchcock as The Lady Vanishes. Vastly successful in her day, White was as well-known as Agatha Christie and Dorothy L. Sayers but fell into obscurity following her sudden death in 1944.

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      Book preview

      Step in the Dark - Ethel Lina White

      safe.

      II. BEHIND THE CURTAIN

      ALTHOUGH her ordeal was nearly at an end, Georgia felt that she could hardly endure the last minutes of the meal. She had a guilty sense of being there on false pretences, as though she had been masquerading in the guise of a wealthy woman, to invite hospitable overtures.

      When she asked to be excused from staying for coffee, on account of her rising temperature, she was surprised at Mrs. Vanderpant’s concern.

      Have you a maid? she asked.

      No, replied Georgia. But I know what to take for these attacks. I shall be perfectly well in the morning.

      "All the same, you must not be neglected. I will speak to the floor-housekeeper and tell her that I shall regard any attention she can show you, as paid to me."

      Her chin elevated in conscious pride of position, she turned to Torch, with the air of granting an audience, while the Count accompanied Georgia to the outer door of the suite. When they reached the vestibule, which was screened off from the salon by curtains of faded grass-green velvet, he smiled down at her.

      My aunt must have guessed that I wanted to speak to you alone, he said.

      She waited for him to continue with a throb of intense eagerness. As she looked around, she knew that the memory of her surroundings would always remain. In after years, she would recall the ivory walls, the marble bust of Leopold I. on a pedestal, and the white sheepskin rug–all dyed a moonlight blue from the glass of a hanging lamp. She noticed, too, an incongruous drain-pipe umbrella-stand, painted with bulrushes–and a steel engraving of a Victorian skating-scene.

      The Count cleared his throat.

      I want to apologise for Clair, he said. He did not mean to be rude. You see, with us, money is nothing. He was cross, too, because he thought you were pulling his leg.

      He stopped and looked at her expectantly, awaiting her comment.

      I am sorry he misunderstood, she told him. Of course, I was speaking the truth. It saves trouble... He seems very fond of you.

      Clair? The Count laughed indulgently. Yes. He is a rascal, but one can’t help liking him.

      Yes? Georgia spoke vaguely in her anxiety to learn the future. Shall I see you tomorrow?

      He dashed her hope with a regretful smile.

      I’m sorry, no. You understand. Family We must all be early birds tonight, for my aunt starts tomorrow at an unholy hour. I am expected to accompany her.

      Then–this is ‘Good-bye’?

      Oh, I may return. But if that is impossible, you will be a cherished memory. Whenever I see your novels on the stall at a railway station, I shall be able to boast, ‘Ah I have met the celebrated Mrs. Yeo–and she is even more charming than her books.’

      In spite of her temperature, Georgia began to feel cold.

      I am afraid I made a poor impression on your people, she said.

      Oh, no, no. How could you? You were modest and frank. Those are qualities which appeal to my aunt.

      Suddenly Georgia was urged to tell him that life-story which she withheld so persistently from the public.

      It must be wonderful not to think of money, she said. "In my case, it’s been the most important thing. My grandfather was a wealthy tea-merchant. He was a self-made man, but he sent his only son to Oxford–and all the rest. Father never earned a penny in his life. He dribbled away most of his fortune on the Stock Exchange. He was hopeless, for he would buy shares on margin. Now, I’m like my grandfather over money. Really, I’m a tough old man with a stubby grey beard and a droopy eyelid."

      The Count joined in her forced laughter while he paid her the tribute of absorbed attention.

      There was so much worry about money, she continued, that we were all glad when I married an old family friend. It seemed security. And then, everything happened at once. Edward–my husband–went bankrupt and committed suicide. I was left penniless with my mother and two babies to keep.

      Your mother, too?

      "Naturally. She lost her remaining capital in one of Edward’s companies. I took a job, at first, and wrote my first novel at night. I’d written all my life. A miracle happened, for it was a best-seller. After that start, I’ve never looked back... But you can understand why I felt I must safeguard my children. They are dependent on me and I am not immortal."

      I do indeed. I honour you for it. May I?

      The Count raised her hand to his lips.

      At that moment, his homage seemed a meaningless gesture. She waited for him to speak before she broke the silence with a final appeal.

      I hope I’ve not bored you. I only wanted to explain. You see, your cousin made me feel ashamed–because I’d done nothing and gone nowhere. Now you know why... Goodbye.

      No, ‘Good-night.’ We will hope.

      Although she was used to loss, the episode was one of her bitterest disappointments when she went downstairs to her bedroom–unescorted. She had been living up in the clouds with a blond and radiant lover, who brought her the supreme gift of laughter, together with a dream-title of Countess.

      As she stumbled along the narrow carpeted passages which ran round two sides of the building, she suddenly realised that she was completely exhausted and that her bed was the only thing which really mattered. She could scarcely drag her legs to her room and when she reached it at last, it seemed small and stuffy in contrast with Mrs. Vanderpant’s cool and lofty salon.

      She threw off her clothes and after swallowing another draught crossed to the window. Below her was the traffic of the noisy street, with illuminated tramcars bearing advertisements of unfamiliar cigarettes and mineral waters.

      Beyond rose a straggling map of lights which defined the higher parts of the city. Every spot was associated with the Count. Somewhere up there was the Congress Column and the Tomb of the Unknown Warrior, guarded by two bronze lions at his feet. As she gazed at the slope she thought of her own village, with the sound of the tide dragging back the pebbles, and the distant line of the sea.

      Although it held those she loved best, she rebelled at the idea of returning to it.

      Not now–not after this, she murmured.

      Feeling hopeless and miserable she climbed into bed. Very soon her thoughts grew blurred and she forgot everything but the present. Her attacks of temperature were not unpleasant, for she lay in a dry baked heat which reminded her of basking in sun-warmed sand. The open window admitted the noise of the street and a faint light from the illuminations below, but no refreshing current of night air.

      The last thing she saw before she fell asleep was her evening frock, visible as a huddle of black draperies flung over the back of a chair.

      When she opened her eyes again, she was looking at it still; but she was conscious of other changes. A cool breeze blew in upon her from the window, which appeared to have moved closer. The room, too, seemed nearly doubled in size.

      This is absurd, she thought. I must still be asleep.

      She stretched out her hand to snap on the light, but the switch was no longer there. She was in the same bed, however, for she could distinguish the pattern of the printed bed-spread–blue poppies on a green ground. In further proof her watch was under her pillow, although the dial was too small for her to see the hands.

      Remembering that there was a view of a church clock from her window, she slid to the polished floor and groped her way towards it, only to be baffled by further transformation. The lighted street and the traffic had sunk into the ground. In its place was a vague darkness, blotched by a suggestion of foliage.

      As she tried vainly to pierce the gloom, she noticed an iron stair spiralling upwards, just beyond the window sill. The sight of it filled her with an overwhelming desire to climb up to the roof. Her favourite dream–sleeping or waking–was of a city of the Future, where buildings rose up in towering tiers and pedestrians walked high above the streets, which looped downwards to the lowest torrent of rushing traffic.

      If this is a dream, she reasoned, it’s quite safe to get out of the window. But–I feel awake.

      She tried vainly to find some lucid explanation of her inexplicable predicament, but her brain was dark and torpid as though steeped in narcotic. Although the strange metamorphosis of her room seemed positive proof that she was dreaming, some submerged memory warned her to caution, as she tried to explore her surroundings.

      Her eyes had grown accustomed to the gloom, but she found it difficult to locate objects. All the furniture seemed different, and to stand in unaccustomed places. Only the mirror was in its usual place above the old-fashioned marble mantelpiece.

      Guided by its glimmer she groped her way towards it. The glass was so dark that at first she could see nothing. Gradually, however, she traced the outlines of tree trunks and bare branches, which seemed very far away.

      Instead of meeting her own familiar reflection she was looking into the vista of a snowy forest.

      That proves it is a dream, she told herself exultantly. Now I’ll get up on the roof.

      Climbing fearlessly out of the window, she stood poised upon the narrow sill. There was scarcely room for her feet, but she stretched her arms above her head and strained up towards the stars, feeling certain that she would float up into the air.

      Although she did not fly, as the breeze blew through her thin sleeping suit, she felt light as a soap bubble. Filled with exhilaration, she swayed out across the narrow gulf of darkness and caught the iron rail of the stair. As she drew herself up without conscious effort she dimly realised that–owing to the drug–she was in a false dimension which was subject to the trickery of time, for she appeared to climb for hours without reaching the top.

      She was also subject to frequent black-outs, when she lost all consciousness of her surroundings. Higher and higher she mounted, until the stars were so low that she instinctively moved her head aside, to avoid entangling her hair in a dangling cluster.

      Presently, after a blank, she discovered that she had reached her goal, for she was walking along the elevated parapet of her city of the Future. She was so high up that she could not see the lights of the streets below, although she could hear the rising murmur of traffic like the hum of a bee. Drifting lightly along, like a leaf in a breeze, she thought that she had journeyed for miles, when she saw–at right angles to her path–the square of a lighted window.

      Thrilled at the promise of fresh adventure, she pushed open the casement, and leaped inside Even as she alighted, she was arrested by the sound of voices.

      Suddenly the immunity of a dreamer deserted her and the phantasy grew mercilessly real. As she realised her predicament, if she were caught in the act of entering a strange house, she felt hot with shame. But even as she darted towards the window, she checked her panic flight.

      I’ve been here before, she told herself.

      The marble bust on a pedestal, the white sheep-skin rug, the atrocious daubs on a drain-pipe were all familiar. It was the vestibule where she had stood when the Count had slain her hope with a tender smile of farewell.

      The recollection overwhelmed her with so sharp a sense of desolation that she wanted to weep in the hopeless despair of a dream. Then, with a lightning change of mood, her thoughts drifted off on another track.

      Perhaps the dinner-party is still going on, she thought. We are all of us sitting round the table, on the other side of the curtain... If I peeped through, I might see Gustav again.

      Parting the curtain cautiously she looked through the folds with the confidence of seeing a stately and well-bred company posed like statues around a formal white feast.

      She was right–for they were still there, sitting at the same table. But a horrible and sinister change had taken place. The lace cloth and the orchids had gone, while the air was thick with a fog of smoke. Around a green roulette-cloth was gathered a circle of gamblers who watched the spinning wheel with greedy eyes.

      As she looked at them, Georgia felt that she was viewing a scene through a distorting glass. At first she saw strangers–a gross multi-chinned man and an elderly woman with pendulous rouged cheeks. Then, to her horror, she began to recognise some of the company.

      A drunken man with a snowy curling mane and a foolish red face looked like a debased caricature of the dignified Professor Malfoy. Mrs. Vanderpant–incredibly cheapened by the cigar on which she was biting–raked in counters with the clutching claws of a bird of prey. The Count, too, was there–his neck encircled by the arms of the youth, Clair, who had achieved corrupt beauty by the application of powder and lip-stick.

      As Georgia shuddered with repulsion, the Count looked up suddenly, so that she seemed to meet his gaze, although he could not see the watcher.

      In that moment of horror, she knew why she had been haunted by the picture at the Wiertz Museum. It was because the Count’s eyes were blue and shining-like those of two lovely children, who laughed as they burned a butterfly’s wings in the flame of a candle.

      III. THE COUNTESS LEAVES TOWN

      SEARED with horror at her vision, Georgia rushed back to the open window. Her dominant instinct was flight as she crawled out upon a ledge which encircled a pit of darkness. Although she had no sense of direction, she felt vaguely that it must lead her to the refuge of her room.

      She was shivering with cold and her legs were leaden from shock. Her glorious liberty-dream had spun away from her, leaving her stranded in the familiar nightmare of being unable to make progress. She knew that she must advance, yet her will to move was smothered in inertia. As she toiled on, she felt clogged and impotent, like an insect attempting to crawl over a sticky fly-paper.

      Her distress was increased by a gradual shrinkage of security. Hitherto, she had been swaddled in the protective cocoon of a dream, when she could not fall; but with her growing sense of altitude there came the threat of vertigo. Although her path was still mercifully obscured, she had recurring flashes of consciousness, when she could feel an iron grille under her bare feet.

      Suddenly she slipped and nearly overbalanced on the verge of a stair which wound downwards. It was narrow and spiralled so steeply that her head whirled from continuous turning. Slipping recklessly from step to step in her haste to reach each successive window, she always found the jalousies closed against her entrance.

      It was not until she had grown nearly frantic with fear of being shut out that she saw an open casement. Swinging herself across to the sill, she almost flung herself into the black interior of a room. As she stumbled blindly across it she collided violently with a chair, over which was hung a black gown, and then fell heavily across the bed, banging her head on the rail.

      She remembered no more until she became drowsily aware of unseen hands which stroked the sheet in position under her chin. Opening her eyes with an effort she met the gaze of a heavily-built woman with shoulder-long dark waved hair, which made her resemble a middle-aged schoolgirl. She wore a neat dark-blue overall, and looked both kind and capable.

      You must excuse, she said in the fluent English of a War refugee; but you were lying across the bed, with the bedclothes off you, as though you had the nightmare.

      Happily aware of sunshine speckling the ceiling, Georgia laughed in her relief.

      I certainly had nightmare, she said. I dreamed that the room had grown larger.

      Then she gave a cry of astonishment.

      "It is larger," she gasped.

      Although the room was not the vague and vast apartment of her dream, it was twice its former size. The part in which her bed was placed was formally furnished as a sitting-room, with a sofa and chairs upholstered in amber plush, a round walnut table and an ornate chiffonier. Over the marble mantelpiece, instead of the conventional mirror, was a framed painting of a snowy landscape.

      The other portion of the room contained her familiar bedroom suite. The bed, however, had been turned around to face another direction, which accounted for her failure to find the electric-light switch.

      The woman laughed at her bewilderment.

      All is easily explained, she said. "I manage here, so Madame Vanderpant asked me to look after your comfort. I let myself in by my service-key after you were asleep, and found you hot–so hot, as if you had a fever. The room was like an oven, so I opened the sliding-doors of the salon. As you see, they are covered with wallpaper. That makes them invisible. Voilà."

      She gave a demonstration as to how they worked, and then smiled persuasively.

      You understand, Madame, she said eagerly, how lucky this is for you. The hotel was so full when you applied for your reservation that we had to give you the bedroom belonging to this vacant suite. Now you have proved its convenience, if you would like to engage it we can give you a ten per cent. discount on the price. There is also a bath, where you can be perfectly private.

      Although Georgia considered that such an assurance should be unnecessary, she nodded in agreement.

      Then I will turn on the water at once, said the woman quickly, before she could change her mind. "You can have your bath before the waiter brings up your café

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